Hoping someone can chime in.
I'm a late 40's wargamer whose sole interest is the Celtic Migrations through Europe,plenty of opponents that way. In the 30 odd years I've been wargaming the normal abstractions used like figure ratios and figure scale really got to me. For the last 10 years I've been strictly 1:1 figure/man ratio and use 2mm figures from Irregular Miniatures,this way my figures are almost in scale with terrain and ground scale.

Over the years I've bought many computer wargames from Warcraft II, Shogun Total War,Praetorians etc but I've never really got passed installing them. RTS is far beyound me,I'm a 2 finger typer and have very limited computer game experience. Never even played Pacman as a kid.

I'm looking for a game with decent troop control for large scale battles. The 2mm armies meant I gamed solo and I'm happy with that so decent AI would be nice.

Basically I'm hoping for a table top game where terrain matters, no 4 figures (representing 1000 men) that can squeeze through a 100 yard wide gorge. One that I can take my time at playing without having to pack away figures. Finally one that won't end up in the local charity shop.

Well, FoG II was eagerly awaited and I reckon it's more than lived up to expectations.

I'd say that FoG II is far and away the best computer wargame produced to date for the pre-gunpowder era. The designers, RBS and his team, have hit what I feel is the right balance between realism and playability - though that balance will always be more to some peoples' tastes than others. The AI provides a decent challenge for the non-grongard even on the lower to middling levels, and there is also the multi-player option to consider (not my bag as I prefer to play against the PC on the whole, but it's very well spoken of).

I've found FoG II and its forerunners - Pike & Shot and Sengoku Jidai - reasonably straightforward to learn, given a little application on my part. The turn-based format is one I much prefer to RTS games. Terrain does indeed play an important role, and I believe that the different army lists work well. There are a number of armies based around the Celtic world.

OTOH everyone is different, and I'd strongly suggest that you take a look at the various videos on YouTube of the game in action, at screenshots, and at the army lists. But for what it costs, I think it's a fine investment. As an enthusiast of ancient warfare it's basically sorted out my gaming needs for the foreseeable future, given that a number of expansions are likely to be in the pipelines.

As Bombax suggested, there are enough Let's Plays on Youtube on this game for you to watch to help you make a good determination. I almost never buy a game these days without seeing one. Steam also has a reasonable refund policy (less than 2 hours played) if you really want a no questions asked refund option.

As for terrain matters, the scale is abstract so its hard to say if its going to be an issue for you but I haven't felt the game to be dishonest in representing the subject matter.

I would think its safe to say that you will be at home with FoG2 though. Think of all the miniature games you have played where more complicated rules would have been nice but it would have been too annoying to keep track of everything. Thats FoG2 in a nutshell. Its a miniatures game that has the computer do all the boring stuff for you.

Cons
- obviously you are not a computer gamer;
- there isn't much space for tactics different than a frontal charge (if against a good opponent), it is not a rant just how the game works;
- terrain matters but most of the battles are fight in the open with some squares of different kind, i.e. is very rare that you cannot deploy and advance a long line of heavy infantry;
- of course there is abstraction given that a single figure are 60 men.

Pros
- this game is different respect the other ones that you have played, no need fast keyboard fingers because you have all the time for your moves;
- you have a great troop control system even with large battles, moreover you can select the size;
- AI is decent but the Multy Player system is the way to go, again you have all the time to do your moves and the server handles all stuff for you;
- price is not high and it is very well supported by designers and community.

Whilst agreeing with most of Alessandro's points (we have fought several epic battles in various match ups already so I can attest he knows his onions...,) I would dispute the point about frontal assaults.
In fact the collapse of a flank through a well executed flanking move or Cavalry fights on the wings being decided early have often been decisive in my games. Obviously it depends on the army you choose and who you fight. A Heavy Infantry slugfest can develop between Rome and Some predominantly Pike armies but you won't get that v more balanced forces or a Skythian or Parthian force....
There is a lots of choice and infinite replayability.

devoncop wrote:...In fact the collapse of a flank through a well executed flanking move or Cavalry fights on the wings being decided early have often been decisive in my games. Obviously it depends on the army you choose and who you fight. A Heavy Infantry slugfest can develop between Rome and Some predominantly Pike armies but you won't get that v more balanced forces or a Skythian or Parthian force....
There is a lots of choice and infinite replayability.

Absolutely!
My English is far from perfection and surely I have not been clear enough, sorry!
I mean some units can surely outflank the enemy but looking at the big picture is not a maneuver game type, in a couple of turns the first skirmish is began, four if one side is sitting on the deployment zone, but I'm not saying is a dull game at all!

It's interesting to hear the different views on how to get the best out of the game. A couple of personal observations -

i) I've only ever played Pike & Shot, Sengoku Jidai and now FoG II against the AI. In the past - with FoG I and the old DBA Online - I've found multi-player to just not be for me. And I've always found that the low/middle range of AI settings on P&S, SJ and FoG II give me a very adequate challenge. I've never even tried the highest difficulty settings, though I'm aware that for some guys they provide the appropriate level of opponent. I am a bear of little brain, I guess...

ii) On the question of flanking versus slog-fests, while there is inevitably an element of two armies slogging it out - this is ancient warfare after all - most of my own battles tend to depend on how things go on the flanks. Playing a lot of games against the Romans I find that how I use my cavalry superiority goes a long way towards determining victory or defeat.

NB The multiplayer v AI debate is one I always find interesting. People who go the MP route tend to be passionate about it. I suspect though that MP - after an initial process of winnowing out the less capable players - ends up as the preserve of wargaming "naturals" who are able to hold and process a lot of detailed info about game mechanics and stats. In that sense I suspect it favours and attracts expert rather than casual players. As for me, I'm just looking for an accessible game that I can dip into whenever I feel the urge, and that will give me a fairly balanced chance of winning rather than an endless series of ignominious defeats!

Bombax wrote:...NB The multiplayer v AI debate is one I always find interesting. People who go the MP route tend to be passionate about it. I suspect though that MP - after an initial process of winnowing out the less capable players - ends up as the preserve of wargaming "naturals" who are able to hold and process a lot of detailed info about game mechanics and stats. In that sense I suspect it favours and attracts expert rather than casual players. As for me, I'm just looking for an accessible game that I can dip into whenever I feel the urge, and that will give me a fairly balanced chance of winning rather than an endless series of ignominious defeats!

I have played against the AI just the tutorial and another 3-4 battles before the MP experience, now I'm totally committed to it!

I can assure you that I played against all kind of different players, of course if you join an official tournament the games will be more competitives, but if you accept a casual game or a campaign run by players there is no pressure at all .
At the moment I'm really enjoying the MP mode.

The problem when a long time SP player starts a game against a seasoned MP player is obvious, the SP player will be disadvantaged becuase the AI behaviour is pretty obvious after a while.
I think it is the best way to improve your skills

Last edited by AlessandroD on Tue Nov 07, 2017 1:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

To put your mind at rest re the MP standard........although many MP players are no doubt happily beating the AI on the second highest or highest difficulty I never played Field of Glory 1 on pc or tabletop and find the second lowest or middle difficulty on AI to be about as high as I can manage yet I have somehow managed to sneak up to 3rd at time of writing out of 64 MP players in the first tournament.
Whilst this is in no way a reflection of my expertise (or rather lack of it!) I think you can be reassured lots of us in the MP world are also looking for fun accessible games that we try and play as historically as possible without number crunching stats or having a war room full of spreadsheets.

As far as computer representations of miniature based wargames goes, FoG2 is about as close as you'll get.

It is very easy to play at your own pace with just a mouse for the most part - some exceptions such as holding the control key and clicking on a unit to bring up a page of rules governing the unit type etc are special cases only used occasionally. Most keyboard shortcuts are optional. So I think the game is very easy to play (despite being a complex game) with minimal computer skills. I haven't tried map editing yet but it looks simple enough.

So if this is the game for you pretty much boils down to if you enjoy the ruleset. Though the game looks reasonably uncluttered in play, you can reveal the properties and statuses of units in comprehensive detail with a few clicks, and review combat logs to see all the numbers and rules which have contributed to each outcome. No wargame is perfect, but in the sense that each wargame presents a thesis on why history happened the way it did with its ruleset, I believe FoG2 has the depth of rules and detail to convincingly simulate ancient warfare.

...as for your concerns about scale, I'll cut and paste from the manual:

The representational scale in Field of Glory II is flexible, to allow very large battles to be represented without unmanageable numbers of units on the battlefield.
However, when no numerical adjustment is in use, one infantry or cavalry model on the battlefield represents 60 men, in 4 ranks, so a cohort-sized unit of 8 models in two ranks represents 480 men in 8 ranks.
When other representational scales are in use, all numbers of men and casualties are scaled accordingly.
Battlefield ground scales are based on maximum effective massed-firing bow ranges when the standard representational scale is used. Thus 4 squares represent approximately 240 paces, and each man in a close order formation occupies a frontage of approximately one pace.

kodiakblair wrote:Hoping someone can chime in.
I'm a late 40's wargamer whose sole interest is the Celtic Migrations through Europe,plenty of opponents that way. In the 30 odd years I've been wargaming the normal abstractions used like figure ratios and figure scale really got to me. For the last 10 years I've been strictly 1:1 figure/man ratio and use 2mm figures from Irregular Miniatures,this way my figures are almost in scale with terrain and ground scale.

Over the years I've bought many computer wargames from Warcraft II, Shogun Total War,Praetorians etc but I've never really got passed installing them. RTS is far beyound me,I'm a 2 finger typer and have very limited computer game experience. Never even played Pacman as a kid.

I'm looking for a game with decent troop control for large scale battles. The 2mm armies meant I gamed solo and I'm happy with that so decent AI would be nice.

Basically I'm hoping for a table top game where terrain matters, no 4 figures (representing 1000 men) that can squeeze through a 100 yard wide gorge. One that I can take my time at playing without having to pack away figures. Finally one that won't end up in the local charity shop.

What say you good people ? Is it the game for me ?

Well from one miniature wargamer (30 years) to another I'd say give it a go. Wow 2mm 1:1 I can't even see 6mm to paint them anymore and I have the Waterloo oob in 6mm at 1:60. I used to play the FOG tabletop rules (15mm) and one of the best points is that the computer does the math for you and can account for more variables. The downside is that movement is tied to a grid like a boardgame it is relatively unobtrusive and the terrain and figure representations are very well done. You won't have the massed troop representation that you get in Total War, but this is turn based so no RTS issues.

I'd say FOGII is the best option for an ancient game and it is based on the tt version in large part. Also it is at a good price point. I would recommend it.

I very much hope you enjoy it as I’m playing a game with devoncop at the moment which is fast approaching the nitty gritty stage and fun it is even if my general seems to have got a bit ahead of himself.

Bombax wrote:Thanks Alessandro & Devoncop. I must admit that I am seriously tempted to give multiplayer a try!

I recommend it highly. All of my opponents have been courteous and fun to play against, with the exception of one but I think that was a language issue. I am an average player, and it is good to challenge yourself once in a while. It doesn't sound like you will pout and go into a funk if you lose, so give it a try.

edb1815 wrote:Well from one miniature wargamer (30 years) to another I'd say give it a go. Wow 2mm 1:1 I can't even see 6mm to paint them anymore and I have the Waterloo oob in 6mm at 1:60.

I have a friend who painted up several 2 mm Seven Years' War armies to play with our group. I used to call them the Rice-A-Roni armies because the figures were the size if a grain of rice. We had fun, and the terrain and troops looked great. I remember that the terrain and organization on the base often gave as many clues about the unit type as did the figures themselves because they were so small.